


The Descent

by SandstoneSunspear



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Bigotry, Character Study, Gen, Implied/Reference Racism, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-22 10:28:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17058101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandstoneSunspear/pseuds/SandstoneSunspear
Summary: How do you explain the unspeakable?-A pre-canon piece exploring what led Lex to commit an act of terrorism and Lena's effort to explain the unspeakable in the aftermath.





	The Descent

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Her Brother's Keeper](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9313268) by [ProfessorSpork](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProfessorSpork/pseuds/ProfessorSpork). 



> So this is the original iteration of my final project for my Literature of Terrorism course that I just completed. It was inspired by both recent events and the fic, Her Brother's Keeper. I've been so swamped with finals that I never got around to ask if it was okay for me to take some of the questions asked in Her Brother's Keeper and incorporate them into this, so ProfessorSpork if you're reading this, my sincerest apologies for that and I hope you enjoy this.

The headline was mocking him.

_ COLULIAN SCIENTIST TO BE RECOGNISED BY PRESIDENT FOR CONTRIBUTIONS TO SCIENCE _

Lex shook his head. “‘Contributions to science,’ what a crock,” he scoffed quietly. 

The Colulians had been on Earth less than two years. There had been human scientists carrying out research  _ years  _ before the Colulians had landed and yet, it was the aliens who were being lauded first. It was such a slap to the face. 

_ “Order for Alexander!” _

He shoved the newspaper under his arm and ignored the way his jaw twitched in annoyance as he made his way to the pick-up counter. Alexander. It was such an ordinary, pedestrian name. Not too long ago, he wouldn’t have minded hearing it; the Luthor name that came after it had dictated the necessity of using his full name in public. Alexander Luthor and Lex Luthor were two different people in the eyes of Metropolis. The name Alexander Luthor meant nothing to the average person walking through Metropolis’s streets. Lex Luthor, on the other hand, was a name synonymous with success, with progress, with humanity. 

Or at least, it had been. Ever since the aliens had started arriving, less attention had been paid to Lex and others like him. As the headline showed, their position as representatives of human greatness had been usurped by the aliens.

“Alexander, right?” The barista checked as soon as he stopped in front of the counter.

_ It’s Lex,  _ a part of him snarkily corrected. But he wanted to get his coffee in peace, so he just smiled and nodded.

“Great! Here’s your cappuccino with two shots and cinnamon,” she said, handing the drink over to him. 

“Thanks!” Lex reached into his pocket and pulled out a ten before placing it in the tip jar. “Have a great day.”

“Yeah, you too!” 

Lex made his way to the door, coffee in hand. He pushed against it with his shoulder and paused to glance at the newspaper in his other hand. 

The headline continued to mock him. 

He bit back a snarl and binned the newspaper before shoving his way out the door.

-

Lex let out a sigh and sat on the park bench. He perched his still-steaming cup of coffee on his thigh and leaned back to watch the people milling about. 

People watching in the park had always been a favourite activity of his. It was different than standing in his office on the 45th floor of the Luthor Corporations headquarters and looking down at the city below. Up there, he was a man separated from his own people. Here, he was amongst them. Here, he could put ideas to faces and see how his work had benefited their lives. 

Lex spotted a Talaxvian and grimaced. He hid it by taking a sip of coffee, only to choke when a human woman came up alongside the Talaxvian and brushed her lips against its cheek. 

_ You can’t be serious.  _ Of all the partners on Earth that woman could have chosen, she had gone for a Talaxvian brute? 

He felt his grip tighten ever so slightly around his coffee cup as he continued to watch them interact. They were holding hands now. It was a sight that made his stomach twist in revulsion. It was obvious from the way that they interacted with each other that they had been together for a while. He couldn’t decide what was worse: the fact that this woman had chosen some alien to be her partner, or the fact that everyone else around them was unbothered by the affection being displayed. 

_ Bloody appeasers.  _ This was what the appeasement that alien sympathisers were pushing was leading to: the co-mingling of races. It was unacceptable. Aliens and humans were completely different species and thus biologically incompatible. A union between them would never result in offspring. More interspecies relationships meant that, in the long run, fewer humans would be produced. 

The Talaxvian brushed its lips against the human woman’s head, drawing a laugh from her. 

Lex’s lip curled into a small snarl of fury. He had seen enough. He got up and tossed the rest of his coffee back before shoving his hands into his pockets. They tightened into fists as the sound of her laughter filled the air. 

Lex could feel blood beginning to pound his ears. How dare she laugh. She, like so many others, were responsible for the slow genocide facing the human race. 

_ Go ahead and laugh at the destruction of our people,  _ he thought as he stalked out of the park.  _ Laugh like the fucking traitor you are. _

_ - _

_ “These people must be treated fairly and humanely--” _

_ “But they’re not human,”  _ Lauren Coulter interrupted.  _ “They’re aliens--” _

_ “They’re non-humans,”  _ the station guest corrected.  _ “And they’re people. People who are fleeing genocide and war, atrocities that humanity is very familiar with mind you, and they are coming here to seek refuge. We need--” _

Lex had heard enough. He shut the tv off and tossed the remote on to the coffee table. He couldn’t believe that the station had given yet another alien sympathiser a platform to spread their corrosive message of appeasement and acceptance. It was pathetic. At least Lauren Coulter had tried to do the right thing by correcting the false information being spread by the sympathiser before being so rudely interrupted. 

Lex got up and made his way to the liquor cabinet. It opened with a soft click. A flick of the lightswitch on one of the doors turned the cabinet into one of the brightest items in the room. It bathed him in a warm glow as the extensive collection of alcohols was revealed. He tilted his head and examined them all, before a bottle at the far back caught his eye. 

He vaguely recognised it as a bottle he had opened during the early days of his tenure as CEO of Luthor Corp. He reached in and pulled it out, examining the dark amber liquid held within. A quick tug at the stopper and a deep inhale filled his lungs with the smell of a liquor so cheap, it could likely strip the paint from metal. It would hurt to drink, but that was fine with him. It would offer a good distraction.

Lex recapped the bottle and shut the cabinet a little harder than he needed to. Without the light from the cabinet, the study grew dark again. He grabbed a glass from on top of the case and headed back to the couch. 

He flopped onto the couch with a heavy grunt. He pulled the stopper out and poured himself a glass. The soft sound of liquid meeting glass broke the silence filling the study. It lasted several moments before he pulled the bottle up with a flourish and set it back on the table. He watched the scotch swirl for several moments before pulling the bottle back and setting it on the table. 

He took the glass and sat back. He brought it to his lips and took a calm, measured sip. He had to bite back a hiss of discomfort as the scotch stung in his throat. He closed his eyes to better savour the sensation and let his head loll back against the couch.

How was it that so few people could see the threat aliens posed to humanity? Surely the fact that some humans were championing them so passionately had to have been a big enough sign as to the influence these aliens had. After all, no human in their right mind would dare place an alien above humanity. 

Lex absently took another sip. This time, it was less of a sting and more of an uncomfortable burn going down. He let out a harsh breath.

Aliens were not to be welcomed. They were not to be normalised nor embraced. They were invaders that needed to be pushed out of the country and off of Earth. They needed to go back to where they came from.

_ They’re escaping war and genocide and are coming here to seek refuge _ , he recalled the sympathiser on tv saying. 

Lex scoffed at the memory. These aliens were from other planets far outside the Sol System. There was no one to verify their claims. If they were truly suffering as they claimed, why would they come to Earth when there were so many other planets to pick from? 

He already knew the answer to the question. Earth was most likely the only planet that had been foolish enough to welcome these animals. The other planets had seen the so-called refugees for what they really were: invaders. They had kept themselves and their planets pure while the people of Earth allowed their home to be defiled. 

Another sip. He found that the scotch burned even less the third time down. 

Very few seemed to understand that Earth had only ever been meant for humankind. It only had enough resources to support one race: humanity. The influx of aliens would not only drain Earth of her precious resources, but their refusal to conform to human values would see those values quashed. Everything that made humanity great would be lost unless the aliens were stopped. 

Lex drained the rest of his glass. It no longer burned going down, even though it had been the largest mouthful by far. He clunked the glass onto the coffee table and sighed, staring ahead at nothing in the dimly lit study. 

_ The aliens have to be stopped.  _

They had to be, otherwise the human race was doomed. 

-

_ WOMAN, 21, MURDERED BY UNDOCUMENTED ALIEN _

_ 21-year-old Lisa Hann, a fourth year at National City University, was brutally murdered last Saturday. Her killer, Garak Abe’laas, is an undocumented alien from Mythalanste and had been scheduled for deportation in just two weeks…  _

The newspaper in Lex’s hands crinkled as he read the article. Another human dead, thanks to an alien. He didn’t know what enraged him more: the fact that it was only page 3 news or that an alien, an  _ undocumented  _ alien at that, had committed the deed. 

_ The sympathisers will say it was just an isolated incident.  _

But it wasn’t. Lisa Hann’s death was just one of many that had taken place at the hands of the aliens. Aliens were butchering humans left and right. And yet, nothing was being done, thanks in part to the sympathisers urging acceptance of the alien menace. The few humans that had tried to take a stand for their own kind had been shouted down and condemned as racists by the sympathisers and their alien controllers.

The intercom on his desk crackled to life.  _ “Mr. Luthor?” _

Lex clicked it. “Yes, Abernache?”

_ “Lena is on the other line, sir. I believe she has updates regarding Luthor Corp’s deal with the German government,”  _ Abernache relayed.  _ “Shall I put her through?” _

“Of course.” 

There was some rustling before,  _ “Morning, Mr. Luthor.” _

Lex rolled his eyes. “You can cut the formal shit out, Lee,” he said. “We’re siblings  _ and _ the CEOs of the company.”

Lena’s laughter rang through the handset. It made Lex smile ever so slightly. It was good to know that the stress of having to negotiate a business deal with the German government hadn’t gotten to Lena. Or at least, hadn’t dampened her spirits. 

“So,” Lex drawled once her laughter had died down. “What news do you have for me? Are the Germans willing to go through with us?”

_ “The signs are pointing towards a yes,”  _ Lena said.

“I can already hear the but coming, Lee.”

_ “But several of the MPs have voiced concerns about some of Luthor Corps projects.” _

Lex frowned. “Which ones?” He cradled the phone in between his shoulder and his ear and pulled up the files on everything Luthor Corp was working on. His eyes scanned over the various project names as he tried to puzzle out what had the German MPs so worried, but couldn’t find anything.

There was shuffling on the other end, like she was going through papers. Then,  _ “The paramilitary technology ones.” _

Lex’s frown deepened. “What has them worried? It’s just defensive tech, Lee,” he said. “We’ve tested and retested to confirm that all of it is non-lethal to humans--”

_ “That’s specifically what they’re concerned about,”  _ Lena interrupted. 

“They’re concerned that it’s non-lethal to humans?” Lex was lost. “Lee, tell the MPs that Luthor Corp does not and will not develop weapons that harm humans.”

The whole purpose of project NLID-2757 was to prevent further deaths at the hands of law enforcement agencies. Everything that had come from the project was designed to be not only non-lethal but also to inflict minimal harm on humans. Lex’s greatest hope for the project was that it would cut down on the spate of officer-involved shootings. 

_ “Lex, they’re not worried about the effects on humans, they believe me when I tell them that it’s entirely non-lethal to them,”  _ Lena said.  _ “What they’re worried about is the effects of those devices on non-humans.” _

Lex sat back in disbelief. Lena had to be joking. German MPs were more worried about alien lives than they were human lives? The very thought would have made him laugh, if it wasn’t so horrifying. 

_ “Lex?”  _ Lena asked, snapping him out of his shock.  _ “What do I tell them? Because as far as I know, Luthor Corp doesn’t have an answer to allay that concern.” _

She didn’t even really know the full capacity of the project. Lex had done his best to keep her away from it, instead assigning her to tamer R&D projects and leaving her to handle the international negotiations. He tried to justify the moves by telling himself that he was just putting her in places where he knew she would shine. However, at the end of the day, the truth of the matter was that he wanted to shield her from any potential blowback if something went south with any of his projects. 

“Tell them that as far as Luthor Corp knows, all of the technology that’s been developed under NLID is equally non-lethal to humans and al--non-humans,” he said, managing to correct himself just in the nick of time. “You’ve got to stress that the tech is still in its testing phases, Lee, and that we’re still doing tweaks and research to ensure that no one, human or non-human, will die at the hands of these things.”

It was a lie. Lex had no intention of testing these weapons to ensure that non-humans would survive being on the receiving end. It was a waste of time, money, and resources. He already had the confirmation that these weapons would not kill a human and that was all that mattered to him. The life of a human was worth more than the life of any alien.

_ “Okay.”  _ A pause.  _ “How’re things going in Metropolis?”  _

Lex groaned. “I wish I had your knack for international business, Lee,” he said. 

Lena made a noise of sympathy.  _ “The board misbehaving that badly?”  _

“They’re a bunch of old codgers who might as well be stuck in the Stone Ages with their wants, Lee,” he complained. “They don’t see the bigger picture, or Luthor Corp’s purpose. They just care about money.”

_ “Did you point out that Luthor Corps stocks are at an all time high and that we’ve increased the returns from the smaller holdings six-fold?”  _ Lena asked.

“You know I have,” he snarked. 

Lex might not have possessed the same level of skill that Lena did for international negotiations, but he was a Luthor. He had been born and raised to be a shark in the boardroom. He could navigate those waters with ease and outmaneuver any greedy old man with ease. Just because he had the skills, though, didn’t mean that it wasn’t tiring. 

Lena chuckled.  _ “I’m just giving you a hard time, Lex.” _

Lex pouted. “Well stop,” he grumbled. He ran a hand over his shaved head. “It’s annoying enough dealing with them alone. It’d be so much easier with my partner-in-crime here.”

_ “If I was there, they’d be giving us both flack for sharing the position of CEO and for me being a woman,”  _ Lena pointed out. 

“Ugh, yeah that’s true.” 

Even though a majority of the board had learned very quickly that dismissing Lena on the basis of her sex was a very bad idea, there were still a few holdouts that insisted that the position of CEO was solely for a man. This, despite the fact that a number of other companies across the country had female CEOs. 

_ “You’d think they’d learn by now,”  _ Lena mused wryly. 

“You’d think,” Lex echoed. “But I guess that’s why we are who we are: to show them the error of their ways.”

Lena chuckled.  _ “The Luthor siblings...we should come with a warning,” _ she said. 

“Our very presence _ is _ that warning, Lee,” he said, a grin rising to his lips. 

Whatever else Lena was going to say was cut off by noise in the background.  _ “Lex, I have to go. Kate’s here to take me out to lunch.” _

Lex hummed. “Tell her I say hello and don’t do anything I would do, Lee.”

He could practically hear Lena rolling her eyes.  _ “She’s married, Lex.” _

Lex held a hand up even though she couldn’t see it. “I’m just saying--”

_ “Goodbye brother, I’ll call you later and let you know how the MPs receive your claims,”  _ Lena interrupted hurriedly before hanging up.

Lex shook his head. Even after all this time, it was still far too easy to get a rise out his younger sister when it came to the subject of her past paramours. 

He sat back and rubbed his jaw. He glanced back down at the rumpled newspaper. Lisa’s smiling face stared back from the page. He felt his stomach clench. She looked so much like Lena.

His eyes drifted back to the headline.  __

_ WOMAN, 21, MURDERED BY UNDOCUMENTED ALIEN _

That could have been Lena. Would be Lena, unless something was done to stop the alien menace. 

Lex flicked a glance back towards his computer. The blueprints and data for NLID and several other paramilitary technology projects. While everything developed was guaranteed to be non-lethal to humans, the same could not be said should the weapons be deployed against aliens. The diversity of the aliens was harder to account for and meant that there was a greater chance of negative outcomes for them if hit by these weapons. 

_ Yet another sign that these aliens don’t belong here.  _

Every threat had its own vulnerabilities. The aliens obviously knew that; it was why they had gone to such lengths to gain the attention of gullible humans and turn them into sympathisers. The surge in alien acceptance was proof that the tactic was working. Sympathetic humans were much less likely to defend themselves against something if they didn’t view it as a threat, after all.

Lex felt like he was one of the few humans who remained unswayed by the aliens. It was what allowed him to see the true reality of alien migration: it was an invasion of the galaxy’s worst. The alien manipulation of humanity was desensitising them to the violence that aliens were carrying out, leading them to dismiss it as violence perpetrated by an extremely small minority.

_ They’re all brutes. They care nothing for human life. _

The only people that cared about human lives were humans. In the eyes of an uncorrupted human, human lives came first because human lives mattered. They were the only lives that mattered on this planet. 

Lex absently trailed his fingertips across the newspaper as he looked over the designs on the screen. Lisa Hann had been an innocent human woman. Her killer was a brute who should have never been allowed on Earth in the first place. 

One design caught Lex’s eye. A few clicks of the mouse brought it to the forefront of the screen. NLID-2757:D. A brief overview of it had him nodding his approval. 

Lisa Hann deserved justice. The aliens and their sympathisers had to be punished for their complicity in her death and the deaths of others just like her. 

NLID-2757:D was just the thing to exact both.

-

He had Lauren Coulter’s show playing in the background as he worked. Normally, he preferred the lab to be silent, but after the week he’d had, he needed to hear the voice of someone who had managed to elude the alien grip. 

_ “Look, the fact is that no matter which way you cut it, these…whatever they are, aren’t human,”  _ Lauren’s voice echoed behind him.  _ “I’m not being bigoted, Greg, it’s just the truth: they are not human. You know that, I know that. Calling them aliens or non-humans or whatever by species they just happen to identify as isn’t going to change that.” _

_ “Okay, so they aren’t human, but you have to admit they’re people, Lauren,”  _ Greg, her co-host tried to argue. 

Lex scoffed. 

_ “Would you call your dog a person, Greg?”  _ Lauren questioned. 

_ “Of course not!”  _ Greg sputtered.  _ “But don’t you think you’re going a bit far there? They aren’t animals--” _

_ “But they’re not human either,”  _ Lauren reminded him.  _ “And calling them people carries the implication that they ought to be viewed as human, which as we know, they are not.” _

_ “You’re dehumanising them--” _

_ “They would have to be human for me to do that.” _

Lex’s lips twitched unconsciously into a small smile at Lauren’s words. “Exactly,” he muttered.

It was nice to hear a human speaking reason. Even if those on the receiving end of that reason refused to acknowledge it, the fact that there was a human willing to stand up for humanity was a refreshing change of pace from all the nonsense spouted by sympathisers. 

He could tell by the way that Greg was stammering that her words had upset him. He decided to let the voices fade into into background mental static and instead focus on the item in front of him. 

NLID-2757:D. 

It was a device meant to disperse personnel deterrents. However, its design and programming ensured that only a specialised, non-lethal Luthor Corp developed chemical compound could be used with it. That could be changed with just a few tweaks, though, provided someone had the ability and intimate knowledge of the device required to do so.

Lex had both. 

He reached up and slipped the goggles over his eyes and set about making the necessary changes. Even with the goggles covering his eyes, he had to squint every so often as the spot welder flared to life. 

_ Change an electrical pathway here.  _ He moved the wire aside and pushed the tip of it down so that it was connected to a different wire. He exchanged the spot welder for a soldering iron. 

He pressed the tip against the two wires.  _ One-one thousand. Two-one thousand.  _ He pulled it away to see the two wires now fused. 

His computer beeped, letting him know that it had finally found the necessary lines of code. 

Lex put the soldering iron down and lifted his goggles. Six lines of code were highlighted. It was amazing that only six lines of code were all that kept the device from accepting and deploying lethal chemicals. It would have raised some concern with him, but his engineers had buried that code well enough that it had taken him six hours to locate it. For anyone else, it would have taken them far longer, if they were able to find it at all. 

He slid his computer over, careful not to jostle anything. He gave the screen a cursory glance before setting about altering the code. He made sure to take his time. Nothing good ever came from rushing through a job. 

It only took Lex a handful of keystrokes to modify the acceptability parameters and range calculations. He sat back and examined his handiwork. While coding was second nature to him, he checked the lines over twice more to ensure that he had done everything correctly. The only thing worse than a rush job was a shoddy one, and he couldn’t afford a shoddy job. Not for this.

Everything looked correct. A few more taps at the keyboard saw the program changes transfer over to the mainframe of NLID-2757:D. 

Lex got up and stretched. He winced at the noise his spine made. 

“...maybe I should have approved that request for ergonomic chairs,” he muttered, rubbing his sore back.

He made his way over to a sealed fume hood as he waited for the program to finish transferring. He punched in the code and watched the hood slowly lift up to reveal what was contained inside: a small, tightly sealed vial. He reached in and removed it, holding it up to the light to examine the liquid within. 

It was a modified variant of NLID-2757:S that he dubbed NLID-2757:SEA. NLID-2757:S was a personnel deterrent that had been designed to be entirely non-lethal; the worst it would do to a human was trigger minor skin irritation. NLID-2757:SEA, on the other hand, was a chemical weapon geared for deployment against aliens and designed to inflict massive casualties. While Lex hadn’t been able to actually test it on actual aliens, every simulation he had run predicted a nearly 90% mortality for the various aliens clogging up Metropolis. His simulations had also revealed an unfortunate side effect of NLID-2757:SEA--it had the potential to harm humans.

It was a thought that made Lex’s stomach twist ever so slightly. He didn’t enjoy the thought of having to harm other humans, but he had no other choice. Stopping the alien menace would require sacrifices and while he valued human lives far above those of aliens, if a few humans had to die to stop the alien menace, then so be it. The aliens had forced his hand by corrupting good humans to their side, which meant that death was the only way to free those misguided humans from their control. Their deaths would not be in vain; they would serve to wake the rest of the world up and galvanise them against the aliens.

Lex looked the vial over. As a whole, the vial itself looked rather innocuous, if one ignored the slightly off-putting tinge of green the serum had. It was hard to believe that something so small would be capable of doing so much harm. It seemed almost poetic to Lex: NLID-2757:SEA was like himself, small in appearance but large in impact. He and it would be the first step in a much larger conflict to free humanity from the aliens, to make them realise just how big a threat the aliens posed. 

A loud beep from his computer caught his attention. The program had finished transferring to NLID-2757:D.

Lex looked back down at the vial in his hand and clenched his fist around it. He walked back over to where the device sat. Now he had everything he needed to make a difference that the world wouldn’t be able to ignore.

-

Lex sat in his car, a manila envelope in the passenger seat next to him. He was parked across from a sympathiser-run clinic and watched as aliens constantly flowed in and out. There were a few humans among their number, but they were more often than not accompanying an alien. It was a stomach turning sight. 

Still, as horrifying as watching humans serving aliens was, Lex couldn’t bring himself to look away. It was like he was looking at a slow moving car wreck; the tragedy of the situation was clear and the incoming destruction was inevitable.

The opening bars to Beyonce’s  _ Run the World (Girls) _ blared from his phone, making Lex jolt in surprise. He fumbled to answer it.

“Shouldn’t you be asleep, Lee?” he asked, in lieu of an actual greeting. 

A groan on the other end was his only response. It made him chuckle. 

_ “Oh sod off, Lex,”  _ Lena grumbled, a hint of the accent of her youth coming through with her exhaustion.  

“It’s almost 3AM where you are,” he pointed out. 

_ “Ugh, please don’t remind me.”  _ There was a long yawn.  _ “I just got out of a meeting with the Bavarian Minister-President.” _

Lex’s eyebrows rose. It wasn’t uncommon for Lena to meet with heads of state; all stages of government wanted to make sure their country was getting the best deal. However, it was uncommon that negotiations and meetings would drag out to this late in the evening. Or morning, in Lena’s case.

“What did he want?”

_ “To voice the concerns of his cabinet regarding the safety of Luthor Corp’s paramilitary technology program,”  _ she relayed tiredly. A twin set of thuds told him that she had kicked off her heels. 

“Let me guess, he’s worried about the effects on non-humans,” Lex remarked dryly.

There was a soft thump of a body hitting a mattress followed by rustling. Then,  _ “No, actually. He and his cabinet just want to make sure that there’s little to no risk to humans,”  _ she said. 

“Oh, really?” Lex hadn’t been expecting that, given that she had told him that the German MPs were worried about the potential effects of Luthor Corp’s tech on non-humans. 

_ Guess opinions are different at a state level. _

Lena hummed her affirmation.  _ “I’m not that surprised, really.  _ _ Söder’s been one of the most vocal German politicians regarding the potential negative effects of non-humans in Germany.”  _ She let out a sigh.  _ “It’s unfortunate really, I was kind of hoping that the views of the German MPs I met with earlier were shared by their fellows at the state level. I guess not.” _

“That is quite a shame,” Lex lied. In his mind, it was a good thing that that difference existed. It meant that there was at least one government that still cared about its human population. 

_ “I showed him the data we have to try and allay his concerns, but he’s not really a man of science, so I kept having to break the information down into something he could understand,”  _ Lena said. 

He could hear the annoyance in her voice.

“I take it you didn’t enjoy having to teach a man how to read simple charts,” he teased. 

_ “God no,”  _ she groaned.  _ “I prefer Aigner to Söder’s, she’s a trained engineer and had the decency to acknowledge the hour so all parties could get some rest.”  _

“Well, obviously you’re out of the meeting, so now you can get some rest.” 

Lena had a tendency to keep pushing through work or staying up late to look over reports even as her body wanted rest. Even though it was something he did too, he disliked it when Lena did it; he would much rather his younger sister sleep. 

_ “Remind me what that is again?”  _ she asked dryly.

“Great question, I hear it’s this magical thing, though my personal knowledge of it is sorely lacking,” he joked. 

_ “Explains why you’re still talking to me.” _

“How do you know that your call didn’t wake me up?” he asked, voice filled with mock affront.

_ “Because you sound like an actual human being right now instead of a half-dead zombie,”  _ was Lena’s dry reply.

Lex laughed. She knew him too well. 

“That’s fair,” he conceded with a sigh. “To tell you the truth, Lee, I went for a drive around town because I couldn’t sleep, but it doesn’t appear to be helping me any.”

_ “Worried about the deal with the Germans?”  _ Lena guessed. 

Lex made a noncommittal noise. To be honest, he wasn’t all that worried about it. Lena was a force of nature who had proven herself time and time again to be worthy of the Luthor name.

Lena must have taken it as confirmation because she let out a tired chuckle.  _ “It’ll go through, Lex,”  _ she tried to reassure him.  _ “This is what I’m good at, after all.” _

“I know.” A beat. “Of course, skill levels take a hit when sleep deprivation comes into play.”

He could hear her rolling her eyes.  _ “Yes, yes, I know, brother. I’m off to bed now. Night, Lex.” _

“Night, Lee.”

He hung up and sighed. He glanced back out the window, absently dropping his phone into the cupholder next to him. The steady stream of aliens and sympathisers coming in and out of the clinic had yet to abate. If anything, there were more of them.

_ Like vermin coming out after the sun goes down. _

Lex was done. He needed to get away from the aliens and their sympathisers. He readied to turn the car on when the envelope in the passenger seat caught his eye.

_ Oh, right.  _

He grabbed it and looked it over. He had meant to send it out earlier in the day, but had gotten sidetracked with putting out fires with the board.  

He turned it over in his hands. There wasn’t much in it, just a generic flash drive. However, it felt like it held so much more after having spoken to Lena.

He looked up and spotted a post box just down the street. He stared at it for a long while. It wasn’t that he was having second thoughts. He was already on a path for which he knew there was no return; nothing would stop him from initiating the first strike against the alien invaders. But putting the flash drive in the mail would signal the beginning of his end and the start of his revolution. 

_ I have to make a move sooner rather than later.  _ He needed to. Each day that passed without action was another day for more aliens to spill onto Earth. At best, more aliens on Earth meant more good, honest humans, the lifeblood of Earth, would be pushed aside and forgotten. At worst, it meant that more humans would die at the hands of these invaders, just like Lisa Hann had.

Lex let out a breath and nodded. He pulled the keys from the ignition and opened the door ever so slightly to make sure he wasn’t going to lose it to a passing car. When none passed by, he got out and slammed it shut behind him. He tucked the envelope into his coat and made his way down the street. 

He kept an easy pace, the soles of his shoes clicking against the concrete. It wasn’t that long of a walk to the post box, but Lex took his time nonetheless. The streets Downtown Metropolis weren’t meant to be rushed through. Downtown was the psychological heart of the city and thus a walk through it was meant to be savoured. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Lex spotted a human couple. He ducked his head to hide the smile that rose to his lips at the sight of them. Seeing a couple that consisted of two humans, rather than cross species monstrosities that appeared to be increasingly in style as the alien population grew.

He sidestepped out of their way and slipped through a small group of people before arriving at the post box. He reached into his coat and removed the envelope. He looked it over one last time, then shoved it into the box.

_ No take backs. _

There was no going back now. 

He turned crisply on his heel, shoving his hands into his pockets, and started back in the direction of his car. People moved around him, oblivious as to what was coming. 

-

The downtown clinic was by no means the largest clinic in Metropolis, but it was the one that served the most aliens. Every Friday, it would expand the number of walk-in appointments it had and open several hours earlier than normal to accommodate everyone who came. 

It was why Lex had picked today to strike. He could have picked another day, of course, but there was no other day in the week where this many aliens could be found in such close proximity to each other. The nature of NLID-2757:D and NLID-2757:SEA meant that he needed them packed together as tightly as possibly; chemical weapons worked best if there was nowhere for the vermin to go, after all. There was also a secondary benefit to unleashing his weapon today: not only was it guaranteed to kill scores of aliens, it would likely destroy the clinic as well. 

He sat in his car across the street from the clinic, watching as the crowd grew. It disgusted him to see humans rush about with warm smiles on their faces and clipboards in their hands, ready to serve alien after alien. It should have been the other way around. Humans were clearly the dominant species of this planet. They had been on Earth first. They had tamed it, conquered it, turned it into the magnificent planet that it was. Aliens had never been a part of that narrative, would never be a part of that narrative. They were foreign parasites hellbent on the destruction of the human race by corrupting good, honest humans to their cause and senselessly slaughtering others. 

His grip tightened on the steering wheel when he saw one of the human volunteers kneel down to talk to a smaller alien. No human should ever bend the knee to an alien, especially to one as small as that green-skinned mutt. 

Lex let out a short breath and flexed his hand. He needed to stay calm. He turned his attention away from the growing crowd and redirected it to the briefcase next to him. He ran his fingertips along its smooth edges. It was rather plain for a briefcase, just a simple aluminum case with a stainless steel handle. No one would ever suspect that it was anything more than a briefcase. But looks were deceiving. They hid the fact that there was a weapon of mass destruction within its metal casing. 

For Lex, the simplicity of the case made NLID-2757:D almost perfect. It lacked only one final piece.

He reached into his blazer pocket and removed a small vial. 

NLID-2757:SEA. 

Lex moved the briefcase handle forward ever so slightly to reveal a chamber and carefully slipped the vial into the space. It settled in with a sharp click. The sound made him smile. Now it was perfect.

He settled back into his seat and reached into his coat again. This time, he pulled out what looked to be a thin black strap. He turned it over in his hands. It appeared to be nothing more than a black choker, but as with the briefcase, looks were deceiving. In this case, the strap hid a thin, packable gas mask. He and Lena had spent months working on it, even if their intended audiences differed. Lena had intended to see it distributed to communities often caught in the crossfire between police and rioters. Lex, on the other hand, had intended it to only be for police and first responders because they were meant to protect humanity.

Lex clicked the choker around his neck. A quick tap on the side led to several clicks as the mask formed over his nose and mouth before another tap saw it recede. It made him nod in satisfaction.

Lex tilted his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes to gather his thoughts. Within the hour he would commit himself to infamy by taking action against the alien threat. This wasn’t about hate. It was about waking humanity up and making them realise just how big a threat the aliens were to them. It was about saving humanity. It was about making the world a better place so that human women did not have to fear being brutalised by alien thugs. With a single stroke, he would remove a cancerous tumour from the heart of the city and take away a resource that these invaders did not deserve. 

With that in mind, Lex opened his eyes. He grabbed the briefcase and exited his car. He was immediately met by a wall of noise. The force of it made him take half a step back. It was something out of his worst nightmares and louder than anything he had ever heard before. The sounds that made up the noise were entirely inhuman. For a brief moment, he couldn’t move. Then, he steeled himself. 

_ You’re human,  _ he reminded himself.  _ This is your city, your planet.  _

He shut the door behind him and began walking. Loathing filled his stomach as he found himself surrounded by aliens. The sight of so many blues and greens and even a flash of purple sent his stomach rolling. These things were unnatural. They didn’t belong here. 

Lex kept his pace calm. The last thing he wanted to do was draw attention to himself before he got through the doors of the clinic. He had to cross the threshold and seal the doors behind himself before he could truly let loose. 

“Hey!” An appeaser stopped him. “I’m sorry, but you have to get in line like everyone else unless you’ve got an appointment!”

Lex flashed the worker an easy smile and showed a badge that he had copied the night before. “I’m here on business,” he lied before lifting up the briefcase. “I’m to deliver this to…” He pulled out his phone with free hand and pretended to be checking a delivery order. “A Dr. Moshtabi. I’m assuming he’s in?”

The appeaser’s eyes lit up in recognition. “Oh yeah, the doc’s in.” She tilted her head. “Say, you know what he ordered?”

Lex shrugged. “Nope.” Another lie. He knew exactly what was in the case. “I just get paid to deliver packages and messages.”

“Isn’t that what email’s for?” she asked.

Another shrug from Lex. “Can I go in yet or…?”

“Oh, yeah!” She held up her clipboard. “Can I get your name first, just so that security knows you’re coming in?”

“Alexander Luthor,” he said smoothly.

“Luthor...wait, like Lex Luthor?” 

Lex laughed. “I wish.” Yet another lie. “You really think I be doing this job if I had money like that?”

She chuckled. “Yeah, I guess that’s true.” She scribbled some things down on her clipboard. “Alright, you’re clear to go through. Have a nice day,  _ Lex _ ,” she said with a wink of her eye.

Lex smirked at her. “You too.” He easily stepped around another appeaser and some blue-skinned mongrel with gills before pushing his way inside the clinic. 

The first thing he noticed upon entering was that it was so much quieter inside the clinic even though it was packed to the brim. Every chair, save for the ones behind the front desk, had an alien in it, leaving the few human patients either sitting on the floor or leaning against the wall. They chatted amicably away as they waited for their names to be called.

Lex’s jaw tightened ever so slightly at the sight. It was disgraceful. Humans should have been in those chairs and they should have been seen first. He had half a mind to go up to the receptionist and demand that the humans be treated properly, rather than as second to the aliens, but the cool metal handle against the palm of his hand dragged him back to reality. He was here on a mission.

He made his way over to the front desk, feeling more relaxed with every step he took. 

The appeaser working the desk looked up just as he came to a stop. “Can I help you?” she asked. 

“I’m here to make a delivery,” he said.

“What’re you delivering?”

Lex lifted the briefcase on to the edge of the desk. “This,” he said. “And a message.” He tilted his head. “Do you think you could write the message down for me?”

“Sure thing.” She grabbed a pen and a notepad and looked to him expectantly. “Ready when you are.”

“My name is Lex Luthor.” There was a small furrow of vague recognition across her brow as her pen scritched against the notepad. “I am a true and proud citizen of tomorrow. And this is only the beginning.”

The furrow deepened. Before she could look up, Lex’s hands were already moving, first to his throat as if to rub a tight muscle and then to his wrist as if to mess with his watch. By the time her eyes met his, the mask was already covering his face. He took a small amount of satisfaction in knowing that she had no idea what to make of the sight in front of her nor did she know what was about to occur.

“The beginning?” she asked. “The beginning of what?”

“The retaking of Earth,” he said simply and pressed the trigger.

Everything went white.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about this piece, feel free to leave em below or drop em to me on Tumblr @sandstonesunspear. Also, if you happen to like what I've written and/or are feeling generous, please consider buying me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/sandspears


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